This year’s Winter Immersion on Maui will be focusing on the 11^th century text called the Pratyabhijñā-hṛdayam. The title means the heart of recognition and it is one of the greatest texts of the tantric trika tradition.

Written by Kṣhemarāja, a student of Abhinavagupta, this scripture focuses on the direct insight of our own divinity — of awareness becoming aware of awareness. What’s especially powerful is that the entire discussion is in the form of a dialogue with the Goddess Śakti, suggesting that She is the supreme power.

The text discusses being absorbed into, or pervaded by, Pure Consciousness, and that there is never a separation between the power that pervades us and the power we use to offer ourselves into that absorption.

One of the key sections is Chapter 18, which talks specifically about the liberation of kuṇḍalinī, that supreme power within each of us. During the two weeks of the program, I will be giving a series of meditations which open students to a progressive un...

The 12^th century Kirana Tantra that tells us that knowledge of the Self arises through the relationship with a teacher, study of wisdom teachings, and direct recognition. Most, if not all nondual tantric practices and traditions contain the same message, which is understood as the triadic axis of knowing.

All spiritual growth happens because of grace. The Sanskrit term is anugraha — and although it means grace, it is often translated as the unfolding of awareness to reveal its innate nature. When the pure, innate Consciousness that is the Source of all life begins to reveal Itself to us, it causes us to long for the knowledge of that very Source. Through our sādhana, we discover that our lives are like that of a little stream that flows into an ocean, which, as in the image, seemingly has no boundary between itself and the sky.

This graphic shows the triadic relationship with a teacher on top, and study of wisdom and direct experience on the sides. But you can flip it any way you w...

We often find ourselves in a constant state of doing. We rush to act, and each deed binds us to our limited self-identity and to the act’s consequences — a cycle that keeps repeating itself. Stuck in this loop, we forget to ask, “Who am I?” We also may forget that we can make contact with the space between being and doing where we can simply be.

Having a spiritual life means choosing to live in this still point between the life of being and the life of doing — a place in which being and acting happen simultaneously without colliding or causing a ripple in the other. In Tantric Śaivism, this is called “dynamic stillness,” and within that is spanda, the subtle pulsation of the breath of God. Spanda is the almost imperceptible movement of Consciousness into form. You can also think of it as śakti (energy) expressing itself as the pulsation of pure Consciousness.

Picture a lava lamp — a transparent rectangular plexiglass box filled with blue and clear liquid that cannot mix. The lamp ro...

We’re all familiar with the Ten Commandments from the Bible. I was recently inspired, while supporting a student, to outline a different set of commandments — a list of “thou-shalt-not’s” — to serve as guidelines for how to help free ourselves of misunderstanding and limited identity. Each “commandment” is actually just a suggestion, because, ultimately, all a teacher can do is offer advice!

The Ten Commandments (Okay, Suggestions)

1. Thou shalt not create tensions
2. Thou shalt not react to others’ tensions
3. Thou shalt not project your opinions and judgement onto others 
4. Thou shalt not perpetually attempt to control life 
5. Thou shalt not be obsessed with and driven by sex, money, and power
6. Thou shalt not live in self-absorption
7. Thou shalt not reject the feedback life is giving you
8. Thou shalt not attack others in your mind or in your actions
9. Thou shalt not close your heart
10. Thou shalt not forget to love life and to love God 

Not bad suggestions to live by, right? But how many ...

By its capacity to create in a state of absolute freedom, Love is an observable power. Love is its own proof, requiring no other.

Parts 1 and 2 of this blog have focused on the role of devotion and gratitude in spiritual life. In the context of that discussion, let’s consider why love is the third important aspect of our sādhana. 

Love is a vital ingredient in what we might call “the cocktail of heart enzymes,” which digests all tensions, patterns, contraction, and most importantly, all resistance to being freed. This mix of devotion, gratitude, and love comprises the nectar within the heart, and its rasa is bliss. However, like when creating cocktails, if you add only one or two of the ingredients, the result is not the drink you are looking for. The flavor and effect changes. 

We each need to discover that unwavering devotion, unshakable gratitude, and unconditional love. When we can combine those in our own heart, it dissolves all misunderstanding and struggle. We can’t buy th...

The millions of stars in the cosmos do not equal the number of reasons we create to not do our sādhana.

In Part 1 of this blog series I discussed several aspects of devotion. One of the key understandings is that devotion is not a gooey sentiment but a conscious response to grace; it is the recognition of the incredible gift from God that has set us on the path to knowing our highest Self. 

Engaging in sādhana is our response to grace. If sādhana is the vehicle in which we drive to follow that light, then devotion is like the chassis of the car. Devotion must be an unwavering commitment to doing our practice — to digesting our tensions and freeing ourselves from our own contracted mind, every time those things show up. And those things are going to show up regularly!

Freedom is flowering within us because of grace, and it will bring to the surface every barrier and misunderstanding to the very freedom that grace is calling forth. So our devotion must include the willingness to ho...

The revealing of higher consciousness is the flowering and maturity of my years and tears of devotion to God. — Acharya Nityani Devi

In all discussions of sādhana, it’s easy to interpret a statement from either a dualistic or non-dualistic point of view, when, in fact, duality exists within unity. This applies to the topic of devotion to God, as it may appear that we’re devoted to something other, when that’s not the case from a nondual perspective.

We can look at it this way: The relationship between devotion and Oneness is the living experience of immersion into God’s heart. God can be both the sole reality of undivided Consciousness as well as the object of our devotion and longing, and these are not contradictory. God is our essential nature. Any apparent duality dissolves when we recognize that immersion in Oneness is achieved by intense love and bhakti (devotion) — and while the dynamic pulsation between the two experiences contains many stages, it is the permanent establishmen...

The wave is simply the energy of the ocean, the power that displays itself as the ocean breathes and pulsates. The ocean, the wave, and every distinct drop of water are the same. Yet we think of our individual existence as being like a drop of water that is separate and different from the ocean. We perceive duality where none exists. —Swami Khecaranatha

The purpose of our sādhana, and the very purpose of life, is to know pure Consciousness as our Self — to have the permanent experience that we are not separate from our divine Source. Nondual tradition describes this profound transformation as one of being absorbed by our Creator. Nondual means there is only one: that everything is happening on the field of a single Consciousness, and while we are like a drop in the ocean, we are not different from that ocean.

This view (darśana) of nondual tradition is a singular message that so deeply resonates in us that it impels us to know that truth as our own, not just something that sounds cor...

Consider the (mis)adventures of Wile E. Coyote, who is perpetually chasing the Road Runner. As the chase reaches the edge of a giant canyon, Mr. Coyote barrels over the cliff while the Road Runner stops short, watching his nemesis fall. An incessant chase. . . and perpetual near miss.

This is not to say that reaching for things in life — relationships, careers, or anything else — is necessarily bad, or that these things are not part of the search for God in our hearts. But one of the things we incessantly chase and get tangled up in is relationships. Instead of allowing our relationships to be the expression of life’s abundance, we get caught in the chase.

Attempting to find fulfillment, happiness, or joy anywhere outside ourselves stems from our misunderstanding, based on dualistic consciousness. As nondualists, we must come to realize that everything is an expression of the simple, profound beauty of life, and we should endeavor to cultivate and celebrate that abundance.

What Is T...

There is only one key to being absorbed into the Divine — and only one key in spirituality — and that is surrender.

The true essence of surrender is the surrendering of our will, and the greatest act of our free will is to surrender it. We all have the choice to surrender, but when we decide to make that choice is a critical point in our spiritual freedom. Make it early, make it late, but make it. We make it not because we are forced to, but because we celebrate the opportunity to give our life back to God. I believe that the joyous offering of ourselves back into our Source is the highest expression of free will.

Tantric tradition discusses the progression of our spiritual life in terms of the means of practice, called upāyas. The highest is śāmbhavopāya, which is the path of awareness, the path of will, and the path of Śiva. A concise way of combining these elements is that it is the path of Śiva’s will to express His own innate awareness in us, through us, and as us. Why wouldn’t ...